Pages

May 24, 2010

What to do with error cards?

Error cards were fun for a bit, I think.

The prices on error cards seemingly were pretty good for some time a decade or more ago. Quality control probably ain't what it used to be since every company in the country has had to do some form of layoffs and cutbacks.

I feel as though with every set that comes out, there are some type of errors.

There is this Delmon Young card that has an error on it. Can you spot it?

Yeah, that's not his auto. Derek Jeter stickers were mislabeled and put on this card instead of Youngs, which shows a whole other problem with sticker autos, but that's a blog for another day. This card is currently up for auction

There was the Cliff Lee from this year that the airbrushing didn't catch the HK patch on his jersey. Many cards have had the wrong picture of a guy on the back (Polanco instead of Pujols on his 2001 card).

On Twitter, DragonFan96 caught this mistake when Topps was showing off some pictures from the NFL Rookie party over the weekend on Facebook.

The logo on the card is of the Rams. Now, this card clearly has an error caught before it goes to the public, but since these are on-card autos and it may not be possible to get Suh to sign all those cards again, it's probably going out that way. Ugh, if only they had sticker autos ... oh wait. Yeah, see the conundrum on that one

Obviously, we can't stop this kind of thing and, inevitably, there are going to be mistakes because we all have faults and that shows up in our work from time to time.

Are there other famous error cards that you know about? If you do have an error card and the companies issue a fixed version, do you go after the fixed one too?

My favorite "error" is the Billy Ripken from 89 Fleer. I STILL buy boxes/packs trying to pull it!! I finally got one the other day, actually. Of course, I could pick a ton of these up cheap, but it's more fun to find them in packs, I think! And really, just as cheap.

It must be retro error season. I was just going back through and filling in my 81-84 sets with second copies of my player collection guys that I pulled from the sets, and taking inventory of which variations I have.

I went through a couple of phases of error card madness. Funny enough, I didn't really get into the Billy Ripken saga, though.

1981 was a banner year for errors and variations; Donruss and Fleer made piles of mistakes in their rush to get product out the door (not to mention famously bad and blurry photos). I actually have two hand-collated 1981 Donruss sets that I put together; one is an "error" printing, and the other is a "2nd printing". The Fleer one was harder, so I still haven't finished two sets of that--but that sounds like a good idea...

The 1981 Fleer "Craig" Nettles was king for a while. The 1982 John Littlefield RevNeg "booked" for over $200 for the better part of the 90s. You can find ones in pretty good shape on eBay these days for under $50. (don't have this one)

Some of my other favorites:

- 1982 Topps George Foster All-Star. The error version is missing the facsimile autograph. (got this one)

- 1982 Fleer Lee Smith. One version of Lee Smith's rookie card has an inverted Cubs logo, kind of like an inverted Jenny stamp. (got several of these back in the day)

- 1982 Topps Pascual Perez No Position error. A discovery made later than its release year. Historically difficult to find; still not that plentiful on eBay. (don't have this one)

- 1990 Topps Frank Thomas No Name on Front error. Comparatively forgotten, very hard to find. (wish I had this one)

- 1982 Fler "All" Hrabosky. The Mad Hungarian got an extra letter. Wonder if it made him madder. (got several)

- 1981 Donruss Bobby Bonds. Error says he has 986 career homers. I think the Donruss guys were working late, and started playing calculator games. At least it wasn't 5318008. (got it)

- 1962 Hal Reniff, Pitching version. This card had bad tint and the wrong number. It was corrected twice, and the third one even used a new photo. The third corrected one usually has the premium. (had one once; want to get one again)